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From  Me  AMERICAN  ANTIQUARIAN,  July,  1881. 

THE   MASSAWOMEKES. 

BY   ALBERT  S.  GATSCHET.    (  ^ 
// 

The  racial  affinity  of  the  Massawomekes  cannot  be  established 
on  historical  grounds  alone,  for  these  are  too  scanty,  considering 
the  early  period  of  discoveries  in  which  this  people  is  mentioned. 
All  that  has  a  linguistic  bearing  on  the  subject  must  be  also 
carefully  examined  to  arrive  at  a  result. 

When,  in  1608,  Capt.  John  Smith  heard,  for  the  first  time,  of 
the  above  nation,  the  reports  reached  him  through  the  tribes 
settled  upon  the  shores  of  Chesapeake  Bay.  These  were  all  of 
the  Algonkiii  race  (excepting,  perhaps,  a  few  tribes  living  on 
the  northern  shores),  and  we  may,  therefore,  expect  from  them 
appellations  taken  from  their  own  dialects,  even  for  tribes  of 
foreign  affiliation,  as  they  did,  e.  </.,  with  the  Maquas.  We  are 
told  by  Smith  that  the  Patawomekes,  the  Patuxents,  the  Sasque- 
sahannocks  and  the  Tockwoughes  implored  his  assistance  against 
their  tormentors,  the  Massawomekes,  and  that  he  had  himself 
an  interview  with  a  party  of  the  latter,  who  were  crossing  the 
head  of  Chesapeake  Bay  in  seven  canoes. 

The  names  of  these  four  tribes  are  certainly  Algonkin,  and 
that  of  the  Patawomekes  or  Potomaks  coincides  in  its  termina 
tion  so  closely  with  that  of  the  Massawomekes,  that  we  can 
assume  the  same  origin  for  both.  In  the  majority  of  the  Algon 
kin  languages,  a  term  like  massa  ineans  large,  great,  and  -ek  is 
either  the  locative  ending,  -ik,  -k,  -g,  or,  more  probably,  the  suffix 
of  the  anim.  plural  -gi,  -ki,  occurring,  e.  g.,  in  Shawnee;  ome  is 
supposed  by  A.  L.  Gruss,  Esq.,  to  mean  lake,  or  water;  unipe  is 
water  in  Paniptico,  garni,  kami,  lake  in  Odjibwe,  and  s0//^q_uoiie 
water  in  Etchemiu.  Wome,  ome,  also  composes  the  tribal  name 
Patawomeke,  for  Heckewelder  explains  it  from  the  Delaware 
language:  "We  have  come  by  water."  Thus  the  term  ome  cnn 
be  ascertained  to  mean  water;  this  would  make  of  the  Mas 
sawomekes  "those  on  a  great  water"  and  this  was  the  interpre 
tation  of  the  name  given  at  the  time  to  Capt.  Smith. 

But,  fortunately  for  us,  Smith  is  not  our  sole  authority  upon 
this  northern  people.  In  1632  Capt.  H.  Fleet  visited  the  Chesa 
peake  Bay  and  sailed  up  the  Potomac  river  to  the  upper  end  of 
navigation;  his  report  is  published  in  Neill's  "Founders,  of 


Maryland,"  Albany,  1876.  He  relates  that  "the  Emperor  (of 
the  Powhatans)  is  fearful  to  punish  the  Nascotines  (the  Anacos- 
tias,  on  and  about  the  present  site  of  Washington,  D.  C.),  because 
tliey  are  protected  by  the  Massomacks  or  Cannyda  (Canada)  In 
dians,  who  have  used  to  convey  all  such  English  truck  as  com- 

eth  into  the  river  (Potomac)  to  the  Massomacks."  "I  find 

the  Indians  of  that  populous  place  (the  Massomacks)  are  gov 
erned  by  four  kings,  whose  towns  are  of  several  names,  Tonhoga, 
Mosticum,  Shaunetowa  and  Usserahak,  reported  above  30,000 
persons,  and  that  they  have  palisades  about  the  towns  made  with 
great  trees,  and  with  scaffolds  upon  the  walls."  Fleet's  brother, 
a  fur-trader,  reached  the  country  of  the  Massawomekes  in  seven 
days  from  the  tribal  settlement  of  the  Piscataway,  on  the  Poto 
mac,  about  eighteen  miles  below  Washington,  and  returned  from 
there  in  five  days;  he  was  told  that  the  Usserahak  people  counted 
7,000  Indians.  Oapt.  Fleet  also  met  a  few  "Hereckenes,  who  are 
cannibals,"  live  three  days'  journey  from  the  Mosticums,  and 
sell  their  beaver  "at  the  plantation  in  Cannida. "  At  this  date 
(K>32),  the  English  under  Kirk  had  conquered  Canada,  and  Capt. 
Fleet  identified  the  axes  in  possession  of  the  Herecheiies  as  of 
the  kind  Kirk  traded  in  Canada. 

From  the  above  we  gather  a  few  valuable  points,  from  which 
conclusions  on  the  affinity  of  the  Massawomekes  can  be  drawn.  It 
appears  that  Massawomeke  is  a  comprehensive  term  for  a  people 
consisting  of  four  chieftaincies,  the  names  of  which  are  trans 
mitted  to  us,  and  can  partly  be  identified  with  tribes  mentioned 
by  writers  of  later  epochs.  The  three  first-named  "towns" 
traded  beaver-skins  with  the  English,  and  Fleet  represents  them 
as  being  anthropophagists. 

The  first  of  these  four  "towns"  Fleet  calls  Tonhoga  and  To- 
hogebes.  There  is  similarity  in  name  with  that  of  the  Tongorias, 
who  are,  identical  with  the-  Eries  (Erigas,  Erigheks,  Eriech- 
roiions,  Grakwagaono).  In  the  Onondaga  term  tchu-eragak, 
/ri[</  c<//,  the  origin  of  Erie,  styled  "  </ens  felina,  Nation'  of  the 
Cat"  may  still  be  recognized ;  they  were  called  so  after  a  wild 
cat,  probably  a  sort  of  lynx,  which  abounded  in  one  district  of 
their  wide  domain,  and  supplied  them  with  furs  for  the  trade. 
The  following  passages  may  also  be  adduced  from  Pierre  Margry, 
De'couvertes,  vol.  I:  "they  (the  Sonnontouans),  were  told  that  we 
came  from  Oiinontio  (the  French  Governor),  to  see  the  tribes  called 
by  them  Toagenha,  living  (situez)  on  the  river  Ohio,  and  that 
we  requested  them  to  furnish  us  a  slave,  as  a  guide  to  these 
parts."  (p.  130.)  "A  prisoner,  said  to  be  of  the  Toaguenhas, 
spoke  Algonkin,  but  his  dialect  differed  more  from  the  good 
Algonkin  than  that  of  the  Outaouacs."  (pp.  133-134.)  "The 


Soimontouans  told  our  Dutch  interpreter  that  he  was  a  fool  to 
act  as  our  guide  to  the  Toaguenha,  who  were  very  dangerous 
people,  and  would  certainly  assail  us  at  night,  after  lurking 
around  our  camp-fires ;  that  we  would  run  the  danger  of  meet 
ing  the  Antastoes  along  Ohio  river,  who  would  most  certainly 
"break  our  heads,"  and  that  on  this  account  the  Sonnontouans 
declined  to  come  with  us,  lest  the  extermination  of  the  French 
may  be  imputed  to  them."  The  distance  from  their  town  to 
Ohio  river  was  unanimously  stated  to  be  six  days'  land  travel  of 
twelve  leagues  each  day ;  but  if  we  travelled  by  water  on  lake 
Erie,  we  could  reach  the  Ohio  by  three  days'  portages  (pp.  137- 
138). — Report  of  one  of  La  Sailers  travels  by  the  Abbe  de  Gal- 
linee,  1669—1670.  To  the  name  Tonhoga  we  may  also  compare 
that  of  the  Tohoa-irough-roonan,  who  lived  within  or  north  of 
the  Alleghany  ridge,  perhaps  in  West  Virginia,  and  whom  the 
Iroquois  claimed  to  have  conquered  (Treaty  of  Lancaster,  1744). 

Fleet's  Most'iGiwn  were  "forest  Indians,"  for,  in  the  eastern 
Algonkin  dialects  mitik,  me'htug,  mishtuk,  matchtok,  is  the 
generic  word  for  tree.  It  still  lives  in  Mystic,  a  frequent  local 
name  on  the  Connecticut  and  Massachusetts  coasts. 

Usserakak  is  too  obscure  a  name  to  offer  any  opportunity  for 
conjectures.  It  was  probably  a  generic  term,  for  we  see  from 
Wm.  Byrd's  Westover  .Documents,  vol.  I.,  that  the  Catawba 
towns  on  the  Santee  river  were  also  called  Usherees,  although 
these  have  nothing  in.  common  with  Fleet's  Usserahak.  If  the 
term  was  Iroquois,  we  might  think  of  ahshare,  knife,  as  a  weapon 
characteristic  of  some  tribe ;  cutlass,  sword;  as'hare  in  Mohawk ; 
from  this  word  was  formed  the  name  Assarigoe,  quoted  below. 

The  Shaunetoioa,  who  lived  in  the  town  most  distant  from  the 
Potomac,  can,  I  think,  readily  be  identified  with  the  Tsonnon- 
towans  or  Senecas;  even  now,  from  historic  reminiscence,  the 
Wendot  in  the  Indian  Territory  call  the  Mountain  (?)  Senecas, 
"who  had  settled  in  the  Alleghanies  of  Pennsylvania,"  Sonotua- 
runu.  Gallinee  states  (Margry  Doc.,  vol.  I.,  p.  128),  that  the 
Sonnontouans  were  living  in  four  towns,  two  of  them  larger 
than  the  two  others,  with  a  total  of  about  1,200  warriors,  and 
that  this  tribe  was  the  most  populous  of  all  the  Five  Nations. 
These  towns  lay  at  considerable  distance  from  each  other. 

The  Herechenes, " haughty  in  their  language,"  were  not  the 
friends  of  the  Usserahak,  as  the  latter  informed  Capt.  Fleet. 
They  are  the  "Hiro.cois"  of  Champlaiii;  still  we  cannot  decide 
whether  the  Mohawks  alone  are  meant  by  this  term,  or  other 
tribes  of  the  eastern  part  of  the  Five  Nations  are  included  in  it. 

From  all  facts  stated  it  becomes  apparent  that  the  "Hereche- 
nes"  were  not  included  in  the  term  Massawomeke,  but  that  this 


term  comprehended  at  least  one  of  the  Five  Nations,  the  Senecas^ 
and  that  the  three  others  were  allied  or  confederated  with  them. 
Indian  history  sufficiently  proves  that  it  is  more  natural  to  suppose 
racial  and  linguistic  affinity  between  the  four  chieftaincies  of 
the  Massawomekes,  than  to  build  them  up  of  tribes  of  disparate 
affinities  and  heterogeneous  elements.  What  we  cannot  possibly 
decide  now,  for  want  of  sufficient  information,  is  whether  the 
three  other  tribes  formed,  with  the  Shaunetowa,  the  four  villages 
of  the  Senecas  mentioned  by  Gallinee,  or  whether  they  were 
scattered  all  the  way  from  Lake  Ontario  to  the  Ohio  river,  as 
the  name  Tonhoga  seems  to  indicate. 

To  assume  that  the  Massawomekes  were  the  Shawnees,  would 
be  to  assume  that  they  had  formed  an  alliance  with  the  Shaune 
towa,  or  Senecas.  It  is  true  that  the  Five  Nations  once  con 
cluded  a  treaty  with  the  Governor  of  Virginia,  in  which  the 
Shawnees,  or  a  portion  of  them,  are  included  as  a  party  stand 
ing  on  the  side  of  the  Five  Nations.  But  this  was  over  one 
hundred  years  later  than  the  time  we  first  hear  of  the  Massa 
womekes.  By  the  treaty  of  Albany,  concluded  in  September, 
1722,  the  Five  Nations  and  their  allies  engaged  themselves  not 
to  cross  the  Blue  Ridge  (viz.,  the  easternmost  ridge  of  the  Alle- 
ghanies),  nor  the  Potomac  river  in  a  southward  direction  for 
any  purpose  whatever,  except  when  provided  with  English 
passes.  This  section  of  the  treaty  runs  as  follows:  "Brother 
Assarigoe  (Gov.  Howard,  of  Virginia) :  As  you  engaged  for  ten 
nations,  so  do  we,  Vizt.  (vice  versa),  for  the  Five  Nations,  and 
for  the  Tuscaruros,  and  Connestogoes,  Chuanoes,  Ochtaghquan- 
awroroones,  Ostagankees,  which  live  upon  Sasquahana  river." 
William  Byrd,  of  Westover,  Va.,  History  of  the  Dividing  Line. 
Richmond,  1866.  Pp.  262,  seq.  4to. 


LINGUISTIC  NOTES. 

BY  ALB.  S.  GATSCHET,  WASHINGTON,  D.  C. 

SHAWNEE. — The  four  historical  divisions  of  the  Shawnee  or 
Shawano  tribe  of  Indians,  as  given  in  their  own  language,  are 
as  follows:  (1)  Pekui,  or  P'kui.  (2)  Menekut-thegi.  (3)  Tsalaj- 
gasagi.  (4)  Kispogo'gi.  These  divisions  must  not  be  con 
founded  with  the  clans  of  the  tribe,  of  which  there  are  twelve 
at  least,  each  of  them  having  members  in  every  one  of  the 
four  divisions.  The  first  of  them,  Pekui,  means  "ashes,"  plur., 
pekuigi;  it  gave  origin  to  the  town  of  Piqua,  in  Ohio,  where 
this  portion  of  the  tribe  was  once  settled,  and  probably  refers  to 
their  "camp-fire."  The  second  division  formed  the  historical 
"Mackacheek  towns,"  in  Logan  county,  Ohio,  destroyed  in  1786 
by  General  Logan.  To  the  fourth  division  belonged  Tecumseh 
and  his  brother,  the  prophet.  The  signification  of  the  other 
iiames  (besides  Pekui)  is  not  known,  but  the  ending  -gi  shows 
that  they  are  given  in  the  plural  form.  The  name  Tecumseh  is 
pronounced  Tkamthi,  Tkam'the,  "going  across,"  as,/".  0.,  through 
the  midst  of  a  crowd,  or  across  the  path  of  another  person; 
from  netkamathka,  "I  go  across." 

ON  the  numeral  classifiers  occurring  in  MAYA,  and  in  the 
cognate  QUICKC,  of  Guatemala,  Count  Hyacinthe  de  Charencey 
has  inserted  an  exhaustive  article  in  the  Itevue  de  Linguiztique, 
Vol.  XIII.,  pp.  339-386.  These  "expletives,"  as  he  calls  them, 
do  not  add  anything  to  the  meaning  of  the  sentence ;  they  only 
show  that  these  Indians  are  classing  the  objects  of  which  they 
speak,  into  certain  concrete  categories.  In  the  Maya  the  author 
has  discovered  thirty-three  of  these  classifiers.  Another  series 
of  classifiers,  called  "collectives,"  is  more  numerous  in  Quiche 
than  in  Maya,  and  we  find  here  a  term  for  globular,  another  for 
flat,  disk-shaped,  another  for  pliant  objects,  others  for  objects 
suspended,  standing  in  a  file,  etc.  In  this  and  in  many  other 
respects,  Quiche  shows  a  more  archaic  structure  than  the  Maya 
of  the  peninsula  of  Yucatan. 

SARAKHOLE  is  the  name  of  an  African  people  inhabiting  both 
sides  of  the  Upper  Senegal  River,  and  engaged  in  commercial 
pursuits.  Its  language  pertains  to  the  Bambarra  stock ;  all  its 
words  end  in  one  of  the  vowels  u,  e,  i,  a,  the  nouns  usually 


showing  the  termination  e  (French  e).  The  pronoun,  verb  and 
noun  do  not  inflect  for  gender,  but  the  noun  forms  a  plural,  gen 
erally  ending  in  -u.  The  personal  and  the  possessive  pronoun 
are  identical.  No  cases  exist  for  the  inflection  of  the  noun,  only 
postpositions.  Nothing  seems  to  have  been  published  upon  this 
Western  African  language,  except  the  article  written  for  the 
Revue  de  Linyuistique,  XIV.,  pp.  80-96,  by  General  L.  Faid- 
herbe,  who  gives  verbal  inflections,  syntactic  examples,  and  a 
very  curious  and  instructive  war-song  of  the  tribe. 

KHASIA  is  a  language  spoken  in  the  mountain  ridge  separat 
ing  Eastern  Bengal  from  the  valley  of  the  Middle  Brahmaputra, 
by  200,000  half-civilized  natives.  The  literary  specimens  pub 
lished  in  this  tongue  are  mainly  of  a  religious  character,  and 
were  partly  transcribed  by  means  of  the  Bengali  alphabet. 
Khasia,  with  its  six  dialects,  forms  a  linguistic  family  for  itself, 
and  is  most  remarkable  on  account  of  forming  a  transitory  stage 
between  the  isolating  or  monosyllabic  languages  of  the  Asiatic 
continent,  and  the  agglutinative  order  of  tongues,  as  Abel 
Hovelacque  has  shown  in  a  very  instructive  article  printed  in 
the  Revue  de  Linguistique,  XIV.,  pp.  20-47.  Some  linguistic 
specimens  are  given,  with  translation  and  partial  analysis,  from 
the  Khasia  New  Testament.  Some  twenty  years  ago,  Prof.  Cu.no 
von  der  Gabelentz  had  published  a  l\hasia  grammar  and  vocab 
ulary  in  German. 


